If We Meet Again
by ineedtogetoutmore
Summary: She had to get out of the school, so Lexi did something she never thought she'd do: she pretended to be Max. Now, years later, Max escapes the school and changes everything for Lexi and the flock. Rated T just to be safe.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: Okay, so I got this idea from a dream I had a while ago, and I decided to make a story out of it. This is my first fanfic, so don't eat me! Reviews are appreciated. Also, Max (and Lexi) are 17. Enjoy!**

**Chapter One**

**Lexi's POV**

**Present Time**

Some days, I feel so guilty about what I did. Who I tricked, betrayed, double-timed. How I lied, just to leave the School. Today is one of those days.

When I first started, I got a little stabbing feeling in my chest every time I lied. Now it's receded to an easily ignorable ache. I think that's because I've been lying for so long; I lose track of what's the truth and what's not, so I don't really know when I'm lying anymore. That thought kind of scares me. It doesn't matter, though, because I know I can never tell anyone the truth. The scientists at the School (or "whitecoats" as the Flock calls them) made sure of that. In a way, I resent them for it. In another way, I know I should be grateful to them—they gave me a chance to live freely, or something close to it.

I'm thinking about all of this as I walk up the steep, carpeted stairs of the house that the Flock and I share, striding down to the end of long hallway, where my room is. I step in, and close the door after me. I tug my dress over my head, take my honey blonde hair out of its braid, and slide into my nightgown. Then, I pick up my phone and call Fang. He's in the next room over, but I call him every night before we fall asleep.

"Hey, Max," Fang says when he picks up.

"Hi," I say. Even I can hear the smile in my voice.

"What's up?" He, on the other hand, does not seem to be smiling. He's been smiling at me less and less lately.

"You know what's up. I'm just calling you because I love you."

Fang doesn't respond right away. It seems like every time I tell him I love him, he pauses a little longer before saying it back. "I love you, too," he says. Suddenly, I feel like we're a million miles apart. His voice sounds too tinny and artificial through the phone. Maybe that's just his tone.

_Or,_ _maybe he knows,_ a little voice in my head says. _Maybe he knows you're not really her._ I shove the thought away.

"Gotta go, Max." And then Fang hangs up on me.

I curl up on my bed with my phone in my hand and a sick feeling in my stomach.

I'm not the girl Fang fell in love with in the School. I'm not the girl who's known the Flock since they were babies. My name isn't Max.

My name is Lexi, actually. I named myself. I wish that Maximum, the girl whose life I took, would've chosen something prettier to be named… But I knew Max. The name fits her.

I sigh, and crawl under my thick blankets.

On days like this, my whole life just feels like a lie.

It kind of is.


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Hey, guys! I have some chapters written, I'm halfway through number 7. Also, look at my profile if you have time. I just updated it, and I think it's pretty spiffy.**

**Chapter Two**

**Max's POV**

**Present Time**

Have you ever felt like your life was perfect? Like, maybe you should go play with puppies or look at some spectacular rainbows or ride your pet unicorn over the moon? Like it's your birthday every day, and everybody loves you, and nothing in your life ever goes wrong?

Congratulations, then.

_SLAM!_ A whitecoat drops my dog crate onto the cold cement floor of the School— the lab I was raised in. You know, 'cause I'm, like, one of those secret avian-human hybrids the government's been hiding from the public for sixteen years.

No, seriously.

I wince as my hipbone presses against the side of my dog crate. It's the same one I've lived in since I was ten, because I stopped growing right around then, so I guess it's accurate to call it _my _dog crate. Whoop-de-doo. I own a dog crate.

It's a few hours later when Jeb comes to talk to me.

Let's get four things straight here: One, Jeb is my father. Two, I hate him, but I'm pretending not to so he'll help me get out of the School. Three, Jeb is a whitecoat, and is not part of the "experiment" that involved Lexi pretending to be me. Four, Jeb hates Lexi and is trying to get me out of the School. Now that we've got that cleared up…

"Max!" Jeb says excitedly, once he reaches my crate. He plops down next to me, ignoring the other whitecoats giving him strange looks.

"Yes, Jebalicious?" I ask. It irks me a little, to look at him. We have the same blue-gray eyes and hair that looks brown sometimes and blonde other times.

He gives me a look, but doesn't comment. Instead, he just leans in closer and whispers, "You're getting out tomorrow."

Now it's my turn to give him a look. "Yeah, Jebby, and the whole world is actually just a giant gerbil with three noses, who is biding his time before he opens his enormous mouth and eats us all."

Jeb pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. He looks exasperated. I tend to have that effect on people. "No, Max. The Erasers found Lexi and the Flock. They'll bring them to the School tomorrow."

"And I believe that because… Why, exactly, Jebster?" What can I say? I'm an optimist.

"Max. Do you think I would lie to you?" Jeb still looks exasperated.

"Yes, actually. But don't worry; it's not personal," I say snarkily.

"You're a pain in the ass, kid. You know that, right?" Jeb asks. But I know he's just teasing me.

I put my hand over my heart, and stare at him. "Ouch, Jebicatious. I'm going to go home and cry now."

He smiles. "Your heart is on the other side of your chest, Max."

I look down. Oops.

"Okay," Jeb says. He's back into planning mode. "Here's what you're going to do…."


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: Hi everyone! Sorry it took me so long to update; I've been crazy busy lately with homework and social stuff (please feel free to break a rib laughing). Enjoy! Also review. It makes me happy to get reviews, and my birthday was on the 23rd, so... Consider it a late birthday present to me. :)**

**Chapter Three**

**Max's POV**

**Six Years Ago**

I had just come back from an experiment when I met Lexi. My arm was in a clean cloth sling. It wasn't the first time.

Instead of taking me back to where the Flock's crates were lined up in a semicircle, the whitecoat who was carrying my crate took me into a room I'd never been in before. There was only one other dog crate in the otherwise-empty space. In the cage-like contraption was the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen.

She peered up at us ("us" being me and the whitecoat, the lovely pair that we were) from under long, black eyelashes. Golden hair partially obscured her face, and she had huge eyes the color of fancy French chocolate. (Not that I've ever seen French chocolate, so I don't know if it's any different-looking than American chocolate. Actually, I haven't seen American chocolate in person either. The _point_ is, the girl had pretty eyes.) To complete the image, she had golden-brown tan skin, high cheekbones, a heart-shaped face, and was easily 5' 7", which would make her seven inches taller than I would ever be. Not that I knew that at the time.

The whitecoat set me down next to her, and breezed out of the room.

I turned to the girl and asked, "Who are you?"

She blinked, and I thought for a second that she couldn't hear me. "I don't have a name." Her voice was soft and husky, the way you'd expect an angel or a glamorous movie star to talk.

"Neither do I," I admitted. "But I guess what I meant was, uh, _what_ are you?" That's me. About as subtle as, well, a parachuting magenta elephant.

"Oh." The girl blushed a little. "I'm two percent bird. I, um, have wings."

"Me, too," I said.

"Really?" She looked hopeful.

"No, I'm actually half alien. Oops— wasn't supposed to tell anyone. I have to wipe your memory now." She looked crestfallen. "Joking."

"Awesome," she said happily.

We talked for a while after that, mainly about the many horrible things the school had done to us over the years. Later, a whitecoat took me back to the Flock. I was almost sad to go. I wondered why this girl was in a room all by herself.

"Okay, guys, first order of business: we need names," I announced when I got back to the Flock.

"Oh, yay!" Said the mocha-skinned girl. "I've always wanted a name! Maybe I should choose something fancy, like Tiffany-Crystal, or Marilyn, or Emmaline. Or maybe something classic, like Sarah or Jane? No, classic is boring. What about something pretty, like Annabel, or Jasmine, or Delilah? Or, maybe I could be called something cute, like Millie, or—" She seemed to notice that everyone was glaring at her and making slicing motions at their throats.

"Nudge," The blind boy said.

"What do you mean?" Asked the mocha-skinned girl.

"I mean that I think we should call you Nudge," Clarified the blind boy.

"Oh. I like it," The mocha-skinned girl— er, _Nudge_, decided.

"I want to be called Fang," Said the quiet boy.

"Like… a tooth? Why?" I asked.

"I dunno," He said, looking at the ground.

"Well, okay," I said. He looked up at me at smiled. My heart did a little flip in my chest. _Don't do flips, heart,_ I thought at it. _It's not healthy. _What? What is so weird about talking to your heart? I held my breath, which just barely kept me from blushing.

"We should call him the Gasman," I said, gesturing to the smelly boy. "For obvious and unmentionable reasons."

The Gasman grinned at me. "That's like a superhero name, right?"

"Uh, right," I said. Gazzy was only five at the time. It made me sad that the whitecoats did experiments on little children. Well, I was eleven, but still. I knew eleven was older than six, even though I wasn't very good at math.

"My name will be Iggy," Said the blind boy. I didn't ask why; it was probably pointless. Iggy never really had reasons for doing the things he did.

"What do you want your name to be?" Fang asked me. My heart thumped a little harder in my chest. _This is ridiculous,_ I told myself. _If you have a mini heart attack every time he looks at you, you will be dead by the time you're twelve._

I thought about it for a minute. I wanted to be called something strong, something powerful. I wanted a name that you couldn't ignore if you wanted to.

"Maximum Ride," I said. It was followed by silence. "But just Max for short," I added.

"Cool," Iggy said.

"We have weird names," Nudge observed.

"I think that's the shortest sentence you've ever said," Fang told her.

"And I think that's the longest one you've ever said," I muttered. He made a face at me.

"What about me?" The blue-eyed girl asked. I looked at the ground. She was only four.

"Angel," Gazzy decided. "'Cause you look like an angel." Angel giggled happily. The name was perfect for her, and since the Gasman was her brother, I figured it was good for him to name her.

That's one of my happiest memories from the School. The following year was interesting; let's just say it only went up from there. But if you throw something up in the air, it's going to come back down eventually, right? And most likely, it's going to be your head that will break its fall.

I know you're probably thinking, _Why, thank you, Captain Sunshine!_ Right about now. But don't worry, I'm not as depressed as I seem.

Famous last words.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

**Lexi's POV**

**Five and a Half Years Ago**

_ The door to my room in the lab (or the School, as Max called it) opened soundlessly, and a whitecoat brought in a dog crate. Fang was inside of it, and he was looking at me intensely. The whitecoat set him down next to me, and my heart thumped out an uneven rhythm._

_ "Hi," He said. I imagined his voice to be deep and manly. (I only imagined this because I'd never met him.)_

_ "Hi, Fang," I said breathlessly._

_ "I have something to tell you, Lexi," He whispered to me._

_ "Yeah?"_

_ "I love you, Lexi. I love you more than I could ever love anyone else. I think you're beautiful, more beautiful than Max," He told me._

_ "I love you too, Fang," I breathed, eyes wide. "I always—"_

SLAM!My daydream was interrupted by the sound of a dog crate slamming against the floor.

"Oh, it's okay, I just LOVE being chucked at the ground on a daily basis," Max called after the whitecoat who was leaving the room.

I giggled, and then turned bright red. I had just been fantasizing about the boy she'd loved for almost two years. The sound of of her voice snapped me back to the present once again.

"So aren't you going to ask why I'm grinning like an idiot?" She said while grinning like an idiot.

"Um. Why are you grinning like an idiot?" I asked hesitantly.

Max leaned closer to me in her crate. Her eyes were bright and she was practically glowing. "Fang told me he loves me. He said that he started loving me when we were ten, so of course I said the same thing, because it's true."

I swallowed, letting her words sink in. Instantly, I felt sad and hurt and jealous and so, so stupid. I hadn't even met this boy. He didn't even know me! But I knew him. Or at least I felt like I did. Max talked about him all the time, telling me everything I needed to know and more. I think she did it because there was no one else she could talk to about it.

Almost a week after we met each other, Max had told me about how she was in love with her best friend, Fang.

I remember saying, "You have a crush on him?"

And she said, "No, I _love_ him." She whispered the word _love_. We were barely twelve, but somehow, I knew it wasn't just Max being Max, and exaggerating outrageously. She was telling the truth.

So I asked her what it was like to be in love, because I was curious. And she told me. At first, I think I was just in love with the idea of being in love. I wanted someone who would hold me, and tell me I was beautiful, and understand me in a way that no one else could. But day after day, Max described Fang, and how amazing he was. It took only a month for me to realize that I had a crush. A crush who didn't even know I existed. Literally.

"Wow, that's great," I managed to say. I was pretty sure I looked constipated, but thankfully, Max didn't notice. She kept talking, and I tuned her out, inserting 'ohs' and 'mms' and laughs whenever she paused.

It was the last time I talked to her. I wish I'd paid more attention.


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: Hey, guys! Merry Christmas.  
Okay, so in this chapter, some stuff gets explained. Hope you like it. Enj-**

**WAIT!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Maximum Ride.**

**I've been forgetting to say that for a while now. M'kay. Bye.**

**Chapter Five**

**Lexi's POV**

**Five and a Half Years Ago**

Later that day, when Max left, (after trying to bite the whitecoat who was taking her away, of course) a scientist walked into the room and sat down next to me on the pristine cement floor.

"Hello," She said. "What's your name?" I stared at her. She seemed to genuinely care.

"L-Lexi," I stammered.

"Hello, Lexi. My name is Celia. I'm going to help you get out of the lab."

"Uh-huh," I muttered dubiously. "Why?"

"Because we don't really need you or the other avian-American hybrids anymore. However, without my intervention, the lab will keep them anyway, and I don't want to make children suffer any more than they have to. There are a few scientists who agree with me, and we've been working on a plan to get you and the others out of the school. We only need to keep experimenting on one of you."

Something about this seemed suspicious to me. Celia was sharing this information with me too easily. "Which one of us?" I asked. _Please not Fang._

"The abnormally short one."

"Max," I corrected automatically, then wondered if I should've told Celia Max's name.

"No, we're keeping a girl," Celia said.

"Max is a girl. Why are you keeping her?"

"Max is… to put it bluntly, the runt of the avian-American hybrids. She stopped growing at about five feet tall, and she lacks the speed and strength all hybrids have. We need to do more tests on her to figure out why that happened, and if we can fix it," Celia explained.

I swallowed. Max seemed perfectly fine to me. "If I agree to this plan… Max will stay at the Sch— I mean, lab? For how long?"

"She will stay as long as it takes to fix her."

I bit my lip, thinking. Would this be the only opportunity I would get to leave the School? Probably. It didn't seem fair that Max would stay at the School when we left, but if there was truly something wrong with her… it wouldn't be fair for her to stay only partially capable of doing things that other hybrids would be fully capable to do, either, right? I could wait, of course, for her to be fixed. I could stay by her side while she was experimented on. Then again, it didn't seem fair that I should live in a dog crate if the School didn't need me anymore.

I admit it, though: in the end, it wasn't any of these arguments that caused me to decide what I did. Instead, I thought of Fang. If I left with the Flock, I could get to know him in person. Better yet, Max would be out of the picture.

"Okay," I said slowly. "I'm in. What do I need to do?"

Celia smiled at me. "We've been studying the way Max's group interacts; they won't want to leave without her. So, you're going to need to stretch the truth a little." I tensed. I didn't like lying— I'd been doing it to Max for half a year, and it wasn't fun.

"You're going to need to pretend to be Max," Celia continued.

"We look nothing alike," I pointed out.

"Yes, well. Tell them that because you weren't growing properly, the scientists injected you with a serum that completely altered your appearance."

I thought about it for a moment. That might be believable, if I knew how to deliver it. My stomach churned. I couldn't believe I was actually considering this; yet I was. "What else?"

"Tell the group what I told you about them no longer being needed at the lab. You will then unlock their cages with the keys I give you, and leave the lab. The security system will be disabled that night."

"What about Max? Where will she be?" I asked.

"She will be in a room on the other side of the lab," Celia said.

I took a deep breath to clear my head. "This seems too easy," I thought aloud.

Celia shook her head. "It is more complicated than I make it out to be. You'll need to memorize a floor plan of the lab, practice what you need to say to the hybrids, and you'll also need to know how to fend for yourself outside this facility. Max seems to be the leader of their group, so you'll need to have leadership skills."

"What makes you think I'm capable of doing all this?" I asked.

"Do you want to get out of the lab, Lexi?" Celia asked me gently.

"Of course I do." I squared my jaw. "Of course I do." Another deep breath. "When do I start, and when am I leaving?"

"You will start training today. You'll be leaving in about six months' time." Celia got up. "Good luck, Lexi."

And that was that. It wasn't the best decision I'd ever made, but it certainly wasn't the worst. Would I have done things differently, if I could do it all again? Maybe. I was twelve, I was scared, I was selfish, and I was desperate. Does that make me a bad person?

Maybe.


End file.
